The Elder Scrolls Online’sGates of Oblivionexpansion will begin with a new chapter,ESO: Blackwood. Blackwood is a swampy area in southern Cyrodiil. This borderland region is where the Imperial heartland runs up against Elsweyr, the home of the Khajiit; andBlack Marsh, the home of the Argonians.
The Elder Scrolls Onlinewill see the return of the city of Leyawiin fromThe Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion, but will also introduce new locations and a city from the lore that hasn’t been seen since the very first game,Arena. Zenimax Online Studios' CEO Matt Firor recently sat down with Game Rant and explained some of the motivation for setting the new expansion partially in Blackwood.
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Building The Elder Scrolls Online’s World
The Elder Scrolls Onlineallows players to exploreevery province in Tamriel, but not the entirety of those provinces. As a result the MMO has been able to release new regions with each expansion, including parts of Morrowind, Elsweyr, and Skyrim that weren’t in the online game’s initial release. Blackwood is the latest in that series of new areas, and Firor explained the motives behind the location.
“It’s tangentially related toOblivion, but it also has this part of Blackwood across the river in Black Marsh and the city of Gideon, which are well known in lore but no-one has ever really been to it except sinceArenaalmost 25 years ago. It’s a cool combination of nostalgia on one side of the map and unknown, interesting new things to explore on the other. It really fits a good mold for us.”
Firor’s comments get to the heart ofThe Elder Scrolls Online’s design philosophy. The MMO was originally launched on the back ofSkyrim’s commercial and critical success. It appealed to many fans who had been invested in the series for decades. ManyElder Scrolls Onlineplayers were excited to see old locations likeVvardenfell fromThe Elder Scrolls 3brought to life in modern graphics, as well as locations from olderElder Scrollsgames like Daggerfall City. However, the studio knew nostalgia alone wouldn’t be enough.
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Balancing Nostalgia And The New
The Elder Scrolls Onlinehas been able to explore some of the areas in Tamriel that were left behind by themainlineElder Scrollsgames. Fans knew the Rift well fromSkyrim, for example, butThe Elder Scrolls Onlinedidn’t just recreate the version of the area seen inThe Elder Scrolls 5. On top of Riften,ESOadded Nimalten, a small city from the lore that never appeared in the region inSkyrim. While the mainElder Scrollsgames have stuck to one province sinceMorrowind,The Elder Scrolls Onlinehas been able to explore borderlands like Blackwood more fully, and give them their own distinct identities.
Blackwood’s combination of the familiar and the unfamiliar doesn’t stop with the setting itself.The Gates of Oblivionexpansion will see the return ofMehrunes Dagon, the villain ofOblivion. Fans are hoping that the new expansion feels nostalgic without feeling like it’s retreading old ground. Blackwood has the potential to helpESOpull that off. With the Niben River dividing the old and the new, hopefully the region will satisfy old and new fans alike.
The Elder Scrolls Online: Blackwoodlaunches June 1 for PC and Stadia; and June 8 for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
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